Green Bay Reporter

Green Bay Area School District, faced with declining enrollment, is thinking about merging schools and other options to address the loss and save money, an area news outlet reported.

Every option is being considered as the school district develops a new facilities masterplan, Green Bay Superintendent Stephen Murley said in a Fox 11 news story published Sunday, Jan. 30.

"The problem is when you lose kids, from an enrollment standpoint, you never lose whole classes of kids," Murley said the news story. "You lose a couple here and a couple there. Certainly, when that happens, having many smaller buildings creates some real inefficiencies in your system."

Earlier in January, the school district released enrollment projections that said a 15% enrollment drop can be expected over the next 10 years.

All of Green Bay Area Public School District's 34 traditional schools are projected to be below their target capacities by the end of that 10-year period, with 24 expected to have room for 100 or more students.

Keller Elementary in Green Bay's far west side is expected to see the most enrollment-decline-driven room by the end of 10 years, using 23% of its target capacity. Beaumont, Fort Howard, Lincoln and Tank elementary schools are projected to fall at or below 60% capacity.

Franklin Middle School in Green Bay's west side is projected to be at 44% capacity at the end of 10 years, while and Lombardi Middle School, also on the west side, is expected to reach 58%.

West High School is projected to be at 50% capacity in 10 years, while Southwest High School is projected to be at 62%.

That reduced capacity usage is proving a challenge for the school district, Murley said.

"That is a challenge for us because if we lose the students, which obviously generates the revenue for us as a district and we’re unable to lose the staff because these classrooms are still intact, albeit significantly smaller, we eventually wind up putting ourselves in a structural situation where it simply can’t support these kinds of classrooms," he said.

Murley wasn't ready to say, in the Fox news story, whether any existing buildings on Green Bay's west side could house a K-8 school.

"It's tough to say," Murley said. "I think the biggest challenge that you have there is actually having a large enough footprint to put a building like that in. If you've been out to the Red Smith site, you know that not only does the school itself and the adjacent parking and what not take up space but then they've got direct proximity to the park that is right next door. So, it gives them the appropriate green space for them for recess and PE and other activities like that."